The government has sold an 80% stake in blood products company Plasma Resources UK to a US private equity firm

Intravenous news: The BBC report “The government has sold an 80% stake in blood products company Plasma Resources UK to a US private equity firm. Bain Capital paid £230m for the majority stake in the company, which supplies the NHS with treatments for haemophilia and immune deficiencies. It said it would transform PRUK into “a UK-based life sciences champion”.

But former Health Minister Lord Owen said sensitive health assets should not be owned by a firm without shareholders and “answerability”.

Plasma is a straw-coloured blood component that acts as a clotting agent. It is not sourced from UK donors, on medical advice since the emergence of “mad cow disease”, but is imported from a US-based company.”